Ukraine calls for more weapons and intensifies “tank battle” with Germany

Ukraine is in dire need of heavy tanks to counter Russian ground attacks in the Donbass region. European governments and the United States have announced the shipment of light armored vehicles in recent weeks, but only the British have already agreed to send 14 units of their most modern heavy tank, the Challenger 2. It is a first step but clearly insufficient.

Ukraine looks to the Leopard 2, the most common German-made heavy tank in Europe, of which there are around 2,000 operational units.

But the other European countries that have it in their arsenals need permission from the German government to re-export them, so all the pressure now falls on the shoulders of the German head of government, the social democrat Olaf Scholz.

The German leader drags his feet as the fifty countries backing Ukraine with military means meet at Ramstein, a US military base in Germany, on Friday. Coordinated by the United States, try to strengthen the shipment of heavier weaponsas the Norwegian Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg said in Davos this Wednesday.

An agreement must come from Ramstein to send “more support, heavier and more modern weapons”, in the words of Stoltenberg. The Norwegian also said that “the situation is urgent” but from Kyiv, for the Ukrainian president Volodimir Zelenski, everything is proceeding too slowly: “The war is not taking a very positive course. It always stops in winter.

strengthen resistance

Kiev needs heavier weapons to attack Russian troops occupying its territory. It considers the 300 Soviet-made tanks it received in the first few months insufficient from the war of Eastern European countries they still had in their arsenals. He wants modern, Western-made tanks that can outrun the Russians.

Western governments and Brussels know that when they receive the tanks, Kiev will ask for the weapons that will accompany them in battles, such as fighter aircraft and attack helicoptersanother taboo for Europeans and Americans.

Stoltenberg told Davos that “(Vladimir) Putin is ready to sacrifice his youth” and that “it would be dangerous to underestimate Russia because it is preparing for a long war”.

Polish President Andrzej Duda told the same forum that “Russia is not defeated”. Poland is one of the countries that puts the most pressure on Berlin to release the tanks.

Scholz is resisting the pressure for now and he’s making excuses. First he said that he would agree to send Leopard 2 only if other countries also sent heavy tanks. The British government’s announcement of the unplanned shipment of Challenger 2 last week changed Scholz’s mind. Now he assures that he will let the Leopard 2 go only if the United States agrees to also send the Abrams, his best tanks.

Scholz has announced that it will send, like the United States and the Netherlands, a Patriot air defense battery. Scholz repeats: “We must avoid entering into a confrontation between Russia and NATO.”

Germany, the European country that did the most business with Russia right up until the war and from which he obtained cheap energy for decades that made his industry competitive, he also remains alone in Brussels, where his influence marks all the transitions. This Wednesday, before the plenary session of the European Parliament, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, was in favor of sending heavy tanks.

The excuse for now is worth it because Washington doesn’t want to send the Abrams. He believes that the crews of these tanks need too much time for training (NATO estimates that the Leopard 2 could handle them with a month of training and diplomatic sources confessed to Clarín last week that Poland has already started training the Ukrainian tankers).

Brussels, special

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